Doing the Drill Down: Less is More

When I look back on my working history — not job or career wise, but considering my own Ho‘ohana emphasis as a manager and coach whatever my position or entrepreneurial stripe at the time — the evidence of my doing the drill down is unmistakeable.

As I’ve heard someone define ‘movement’ recently, mine hasn’t just been spurts of passion, but a collective shout. The spurts have been passionate for sure… ‘less is more’ and ‘smaller is better’ and ‘focus like a laser’ among them. The shout is Focus.

You can’t save the world, but you can effect good change in your corner of it. Do one thing at a time, and do it well.

I call it ‘doing the drill down’ for I see that I keep moving from being a generalist to a specialist, and from making lists of possibilities to eventually working on just one thing on that list — especially when I’m coaching others. If they’re to succeed, we have to choose our habit-changing battles or creative reinventions carefully, and then we have to go all in, and focus on very specific action.

No action, no change.
No stickiness.

Examples are helpful, I know, so to respect the privacy of my clients we’ll use me as an example. My own drill down has looked something like this:

School’s over. Time to be an adult and go to work.
Why just have a job? I’ll be a manager; it suits me.
Managing is a profound responsibility; I’ve got to manage in a Pono way.
Values-based management is clearly becoming the way to go for me.
Leadership? Not there yet. Let’s talk Sense of Place.
Now let’s talk managing with Aloha.
Being a manager requires answering a very specific Calling.
We need The Daily 5 Minutes for better listening. We need to learn from people.
Now let’s talk business model for all of this. As a sensibility for work.
We need to define Culture, don’t we” yes, in our Language of We-Intention.
Now is it time for Leadership? Break it down… to creating more Human Energy.
Technology is changing the game radically. So is generational demographics.
Yikes! Where is the conversation? “Let’s talk” isn’t happening as much as it should.
We need The Daily 5 Minutes for speaking up. As an acquired wisdom.

I could probably tweak it even more specifically, but that’s a pretty good draft.

Doing the drill down takes time — that phrase ‘all in good time’ comes to mind — for I’m talking about years of Ho‘ohana movement here. In my case (my habit rhythm, my value-driving) ‘Ike loa, the value of learning, always looms so large. I love study, and wayfinding. Learning exploration factors into that listing of possibilities I’ll do, as a kind of thinking exercise with qualifying my drill down: When all is said and done, and I make my choice (with the next drill down I take) will I be okay with knowing what I’ve eliminated, or put aside as periphery for now?

I’m starting to wonder just how specific and focused it’s possible to get. How far can doing the drill down actually go, and be successful?

One thing is for sure: In my Ho‘ohana, ‘Less is more’ makes me much happier.

Comments

A little more on this:You can’t save the world, but you can effect good change in your corner of it. Do one thing at a time, and do it well.

I like the advice Leo Babauta is known for giving in regard to habit-building: He calls these 4 things his “nutshell principles”
1. Start very small.
2. Do only one change at a time.
3. Be present and enjoy the activity (don’t focus on results).
4. Be grateful for every step you take.
Read more here: How I Changed My Life, In Four Lines

A lesson learned from me in regard to his 3rd principle above: You have already focused on the result you want, when you chose to embark on the change in the first place – it was your WHY if you began ‘with the end in mind.’ So be present in the journey to enjoy the shift you make, and notice all of it.

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